The deputy minister in the prime minister's department, Shahrizat Abdul Jalil, is promoted to the newly created women's affairs ministry. Of the new appointees, she is the only elected. The director-general of Pusat Islam, Abdul Hamid Zainal Abidin, a retired brigadier-general who was chief imam of the Armed Forces, succeeds Dato' Abdul Hamid Othman, who resigned.

The Prime Minister's sudden visit to the Sultan of Johore in Johore Bahru before he left for Myanmar has, it is rumoured, to do with a replacement for Dato' Hamid Othman. He had all along wanted the Mufti of Johore as his religious affairs minister but he had not cleared this appointment with the sultan; so Dato' Hamid Othman was appointed. The mufti has an aggressive anti-PAS view of Islam and is brought in for that. If he is not appointed, Brig.-Gen. Hamid Zainal Abidin, a retired imam of the Armed Forces, could well be. He is now so unpopular with the Masjid Negara congregation that when he occasionally delivers the Friday sermon, the worshippers just walk away.

Which is why I hear, I suppose, more talk these days of a a state of emergency to halt UMNO's political drift. But could the Prime Minister impose one and be fully confident he could then rule what is left of his roost? Could the Armed Forces be trusted to go back to the barracks after their work is done? After the 13 May racial riots, it did. Would it now? Would the Prime Minister's political health be enhanced should, after an emergency is imposed, He Who Must Be Destroyed At All Cost is released from Sungei Buloh prison to become president of Parti KeADILan Negara?

Two intransigient men hold the key: The Prime Minister and his nemesis, Dato' Seri Anwar. The theocratic PAS's gains would not have been as dramatic, nor UMNO's electoral decline as stark, without the cultural fallout from how Dato' Seri Anwar was treated. It affects all levels of society. The government is moribund. The Armed Forces is divided. The police impresses one for its bullying. The judiciary is unreliable, and this is affirmed by the two contentious trials which jailed Dato' Seri Anwar. Mr Mahfuz Omar opened another front: to pressure the government with passive resistance. On hindsight, this is what Mr Lim Guan Eng, the son of the DAP national chairman, Mr Lim Kit Siang, should have done. Not to appeal, but to go to prison. The courts judge people harshly and play safe knowing full well it would be appealed.

Singapore has built showpiece homes whose inhabitants -- one cannot describe them as anything but that -- can control their lives with a flick of a switch: groceries automatically delivered when supplies run short, electronically have control of their houses even from thousands of miles away, but with no control over one's lives except as an automaton. It is technology run riot. In this world, no doubt, the e-book would have a place. The high technology inherent in this make-believe world would make it oldfashioned to read a book. But for it to succeed, it must replace the extant human nature that governed civilisations. It is after all the barefoot Vietnames army which annhilated the super technological United States Armed Forces, with its brilliant electronic wizardry and awesome killing machines.

SINGAPORE IS IN a quandry. Its Armed Forces have the most powerful weaponry in Southeast Asia. Its education system turns out graduates whose workplace is the world. Now the Southeast Asian bedroom community for globalisation, it transformed, in four decades, as Mr Lee Kuan Yew put its, from the third world to the first. It second guesses the future and changes accordingly. It is a genetic laboratory, in which the government decides, brooking no opposition, on what is best for the state. In a region where different standards measure progress, whatever its leaders might say, in which cultural, religious and other unquantifiable standards mould growth and development, the Singapore experience provoked envy and disgruntle. Singapore now decides its people lack critical thinking and computer skills. The robots it create, in this genetic laboratory, is fashioned to an ideal in which culture, religion, community is important only when the state insists. But creativity and critical thinking is not what you can accuse a Singaporean of. Singapore has become a society in which its citizens would rather be someone else: many in a recent survey would rather be Caucasian or Japanese. Success is the only goal, and that is measured by a slide rule: when the rest of the world live by other standards, its successes, certainly in the short term, gives it an edge -- in the short term.

DURING WORLD WAR II, three young Malays -- two army officers in the Indian army and a Cambridge graduate with All-India Radio -- shared a house in New Delhi. Malaya was a colonial shorthand for two Straits Settlements, a colony, four Federated and five unfederated Malay states; it was not to become an entity until 1948 when, in the aftermath of the failed Malayan Union proposals, the Federation of Malaya was formed, a name it kept with independent nine years later. The outbreak of war changed their plans and ensured their tryst with destiny. The trio rose to be highest in their calling in independent Malaya and Malaysia. The young Cambridge graduate rose to be head of the Malaysian judiciary as Lord President of Malaysia, Tun Mohamed Suffian Hashim. Of the two Indian Army officers, one became prime minister (Tun Hussein Onn) and the other chief of the the Malaysian Armed Forces (Gen. Tun Ibrahim Ismail). The death of Tun Suffian yesterday at 83 yesterday (27 Sept 00), leaves Tun Ibrahim, still in good health despite the ravages of old age, the only one of this trio still alive, and an irrevocable break with the post.

The Malaysian cabinet, we are told, orders the Armed Forces to patrol the seas off the coast of Sabah, deploy troops in all resort islands, and have the Abu Sayyaf rebels shiver in their pants should it kidnap Malaysians ever again. Why did the defence minister, Dato' Seri Najib Tun Abdul Razak, take a national security operational matter to the cabinet? Should not the Armed Forces be deployed not because the cabinet wants it to, but to safeguard the territorial integrity of the country? Does it require cabinet approval to do that? Why was not the cabinet -- if indeed it is this price-fixing body which should approve Armed Forces' movements -- then depoloyed in April when the larger crisis broke out? And would the cabinet tell us whether Sipadan Island, which with neighbouring Litigan, has resorts operated by the Prime Ministerial son? And if they are Malaysia's, why did Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta refer their contending claims to ownership of these two islands to the International Court of Justice at the Hague?

The Prime Minister, in his Merdeka Day speech, castigated those Chinese groups who he insists made unreasonable demands as communists, provided UMNO Youth and extreme Malay groups to rise in anti-Chinese mayhem. But his address climaxed a runup the previous month in which Malay-Chinese divisions became more pronounced, with the UMNO youth Hishamuddin Hussein not only encouraging UMNO Youth protests at the Chinese Assembly Hall in Kuala Lumpur. Gone was the Prime Minister's irrelevant but confident belief that a Chinese could be Prime Minister; he could be, but not hold senior positions in the administration, police force, Armed Forces or elsewhere except as a token presence. The current crisis, for that is what it is, rose from 17 demands of the Chinese organisations elections group called Suqui, which the National Front and notably the Malaysian Chinese Association accepted before the November 1999 general elections. Now that is decried as communist-inspired. UMNO Youth warns any to view the Prime Minister in any but nationalist terms.

Closer home, there is the Sipadan kidnap, and the Grik arms heist. Both are sandiwaras. No doubt about that. There is more than meets the eye. When the Philippines stood firm about conducting the negotiations for the release of those kidnapped -- as they must for the Malaysian writ does not run in Mindanao, nor even Manila's as fully as it wishes -- the Prime Minister allowed it to be turned into a sandiwara: now a Philippines newspaper reveals a retired general shut off the radar just before the kidnap. One does not know if this specific allegation is true or false, but the Malaysian Armed Forces' active involvement in southern Mindanao affairs is an ill-kept secret. The only retired general I know who married a Filipina is Lieut.-General Raja Rashid bin Raja Badiozaman, the younger brother of Raja Tun Mohar and grandson of the Sultan Abdullah of Perak who signed the Pangkor Treaty in 1874, which brought the British colonial presence in the Malay states and who two years later was implicated in the murder of the first British Resident of Perak, Mr J.W.W. Birch, at Pasar Salak two years later; he was also director-general of military intelligence until his retirement earlier this decade. He is now a business man. He was at Sandhurst with the Myanmar finance minister, Brig. Gen. Abel, in the 1960s.

The English College retained that hold among students, especially when many came from the outlying towns for the Form Six. The NST articles does not do justice to its distinguished alumni. Such members of the Johore Royal Family who went to English College, like the Sultan, did not complete their education there but went on to schools overseas. So, the choice of distinguished alumni is unfortunate: the list is more distinguished than what is provided. Besides Tun Hussein, Prof. Ungku Aziz, Dato' Syed Hussein Alatas, the late deputy prime minister, Tun Ismail Abdul Rahman, his brother Sulaiman (also a cabinet minister), the Kuok brothers, their brother-in-law, Mr Leslie Cheah, at least one Lord President, numerous judges, two Armed Forces chiefs of staff, Prof. Toh Ban Hock of Sydney University, Prof Louis Lim. Even Tok Mat, who is listed, would agree that our class mates Ban Hock and Louis have their reputations etched in stone and ours ours on sand.

So, why are we told a blatant lie? Is Country Heights in Sungei Besi or Kajang? Or is the Prime Minister's residence alone hived off to the jurisdiction of Sungei Besi, while the rest remain with Kajang? Or does he find it demeaning that the prime minister of Malaysia should be staying in a private house he owns in a state of the federation? If indeed, there is a prime ministerial residence in Sungei Besi, how is it that few have heard of it? Or are accusations of cronyistic behaviour getting to him that he wants to distance himself from this Crony? Tan Sri Lee is so sure of his patron's support that he wanted for himself the military reserve land that adjoins the Sungei Besi military camp, promising in return to build an Armed Forces Academy in the Malaysian equivalent of Ougadougou -- Kluang. The Armed Forces, for once, put its foot down, and Tan Sri Lee backs down. It took a while explaining to the Man himself on the immense morale problems this would have on the Armed Forces as a whole when its installations are bargained for 30 shekels of silver. The Armed Forces very properly decided that its institutional memory deserves more attention than the current administration's respect for institutions.

For it now becomes clear that Park May and Intrakota are not there to provide an efficient service. Intrakota unilaterally and suddenly decided that on the morning of Hari Raya Haji, the bus services would be suspended to enable its staff to attend prayers. This is underheard of in the past. It was quickly cancelled. But that it could do this without compunction is a sign of matters to come. Would MAS dare to stop flying because it is time for prayers? It would not dare do such a thing because of competition. Besides, it might reflect on why a brigadier and six officers of the Malaysian Armed Forces were killed during Indonesia's confrontation of Malaysia: all of them were at prayers deep in the Sarawak jungles, when the Muslim Indonesian soldiers shot them.

General Dato' Mohamed Zaidi Zainuddin is the new Army chief, in effect the number two in the Malaysian Armed Forces. He is also the youngest ever to hold the post at 49. What is also remarkable is that just a year ago, he became major-general, six months later lieutenant general and now general and army chief. He says his emphasis would be on human resources development, and makes the required homily these days to fiscal cutbacks and the consequent austerity requirements.

Pak Lah (1364)   United States (636)   Straits Times (412)   Samy Vellu (224)   Putra Jaya (200)   Chief Justice (200)   Saddam Hussein (188)   Vincent Tan (164)   Civil Service (154)   Parti KeADILan (148)   Islamic State (118)   Johore Bahru (100)   Sungei Buloh (94)   Bukit Tinggi (88)   Abdul Razak (80)   Pengkalen Pasir (68)   Ting Pek (64)   Armed Forces (59)   Soviet Union (58)

Malay Dominance (58)   Yong Teck (56)   Hong Kong (56)   Human Rights (56)   Syed Hamid (54)   Puteri UMNO (52)   Islam Hadhari (52)   Royal Commission (51)   Hussein Onn (51)   Rafidah Aziz (48)   Indian Congress (48)   Open House (44)   Vision Schools (44)   Shah Alam (44)   Malay Unity (42)   Chua Jui (42)   Abdul Taib (42)   Ampang Jaya (36)   Ras Adiba (36)

Osama Bin Laden (36)   Nik Aziz Nik (20)   Ling Liong Sik (18)   Lee Kuan Yew (18)

High Court Judge (14)   Wan Azizah Wan (9)   Lim Kit Siang (9)   Megat Junid Megat (8)

Mahathir (2960)

Anwar (2399)